Lakshmi Paudel is a sixteen-year-old orphan in a village in western Nepal. She and her sister run their household, do farm chores, and look after their younger sib-lings. Orphans can be targets of human trafficking. “Employments agents” exploit young people’s natural desire to improve their lives and their curiosity to see the world, as well as their trust in adults. Traffickers then sell them into forced labor or unpaid prostitution. Caritas pays Lakshmi’s school fees so that she does not need to drop out of school. It is one of the photos in the exhibition. Photo by Katie Orlinsky/Caritas
Caritas staff members and colleagues from six continents were in Rome for Caritas Internationalis governance meetings this week. They also had time to see a photo exhibit showcasing Caritas’ work to stop human trafficking and unsafe migration.
The exhibit, hosted at the residence of U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See Miguel Diaz and funded by the U.S. Embassy to the Holy See, featured images of young women in Nepal who are at risk of being trafficked.
The photographs, which were taken by Katie Orlinsky, showed rural and urban scenes of women in Nepal, one of Asia’s poorest countries.
Caritas members around the world work together to raise awareness of false job advertising and other tactics that traffickers use to lure women into unsafe situations. Continue reading
